Viekira XR News

WEDNESDAY, June 21, 2017 – There are mixed results from a new study on the use of monetary rewards to help boost the odds that HIV-infected patients will enter care, and take their meds as directed. The study, conducted at HIV clinics in New York City and Washington, D.C., found that financial incentives such as gift cards could improve the likelihood that HIV patients would take antiretroviral medications that suppress the AIDS-causing virus. But the effect was modest in patients already receiving care, and the gift cards had little effect on increasing the number of new HIV-positive patients who got treated, the study authors said. Still, lead author Dr. Wafaa El-Sadr called the results "encouraging" and said they "should motivate efforts to pursue the further assessment of using financial incentives in HIV treatment programs and to determine their potential impact when scaled up." ... Read more

WEDNESDAY, May 31, 2017 – More Americans with HIV are sticking with medications that turn a fatal disease into a manageable condition, a new study shows. "This represents a lot of people who are not dying and not infecting others," said study corresponding author Ira Wilson, chair of Brown University's Health Services Policy and Practice Department, in Providence, R.I. "These differences represent tremendous, very real benefit," he added in a university news release. While there have been significant increases in how long HIV patients take their medications, many people still stop taking the drugs after a few years, the researchers cautioned. In the study, the researchers analyzed data from nearly 43,600 Medicaid patients in 14 states from 2001 to 2010, and found the length of time patients kept taking antiretroviral medications increased more than 50 percent. In 2001-2003, half of ... Read more

THURSDAY, Dec. 1, 2016 – A significant number of people with HIV have strains of the AIDS-causing virus that are resistant to both older and newer drugs, researchers report. The researchers looked at 712 HIV patients worldwide whose infection was not controlled by antiretroviral drugs. They found that 16 percent of patients whose infection was resistant to modern drugs had HIV mutations linked with resistance to older drugs called thymidine analogues. Among patients whose HIV had this mutation, 80 percent were also resistant to tenofovir, the main drug in most modern HIV treatment and prevention programs, the researchers reported. The findings were published in the Nov. 30 issue of The Lancet Infectious Diseases journal. "We were very surprised to see that so many people were resistant to both drugs, as we didn't think this was possible," study lead author Ravi Gupta, of University ... Read more

ISSUE: The FDA is warning about the risk of hepatitis B virus (HBV) becoming an active infection again in any patient who has a current or previous infection with HBV and is treated with certain direct-acting antiviral (DAA) medicines for hepatitis C virus. In a few cases, HBV reactivation in patients treated with DAA medicines resulted in serious liver problems or death. HBV reactivation usually occurred within 4-8 weeks. As a result, FDA is requiring a Boxed Warning, our most prominent warning, about the risk of HBV reactivation to be added to the drug labels of these DAAs directing health care professionals to screen and monitor for HBV in all patients receiving DAA treatment. This warning will also be included in the patient information leaflet or Medication Guides for these medicines. BACKGROUND: Direct-acting antiviral medicines are used to treat chronic hepatitis C virus (HCV) ... Read more

NORTH CHICAGO, Ill., July 25, 2016 /PRNewswire/ – AbbVie (NYSE: ABBV), a global biopharmaceutical company, today announced that the U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA) has approved a New Drug Application (NDA) for Viekira XR (dasabuvir, ombitasvir, paritaprevir and ritonavir) extended-release tablets. Viekira XR is a once-daily, extended-release co-formulation of the active ingredients in Viekira Pak (ombitasvir, paritaprevir, and ritonavir tablets; dasabuvir tablets) and is for the treatment of patients with chronic genotype 1 (GT1) hepatitis C virus (HCV) infection, including those with compensated cirrhosis (Child-Pugh A). Viekira XR is not for people with decompensated cirrhosis. Viekira XR is the first co-formulated three direct-acting antiviral (DAA) treatment for adult patients with GT1 HCV. Viekira XR is given once-daily as three oral tablets and must be taken with a meal. ... Read more